Sunday, January 2, 2005

Kelly Freas Services

Funeral services for Frank Kelly Freas are being held tomorrow afternoon in Canoga Park, California at 1 PM. If anyone wants the information, drop me a private note and I'll forward what I have.

• Posted at 4:19 PM · LINK

A Better Idea

The other day, I suggested that a good place to send your money for disaster relief was the Red Cross. This is still a good idea but I have a better suggestion.

If you have money to send and you want to see it used by an organization that truly puts it where it'll do the most good, give it to Operation U.S.A. This is not a well-known outfit but I know some of the folks involved in it and, trust me, they work their butts off to help others and take nothing for themselves. For years, Operation U.S.A. has quietly been feeding and caring for people who need both, often in venues that the more famous causes cannot get to. They have my highest recommendation as a force for good in the world.

• Posted at 1:34 PM · LINK

Frank Kelly Freas, R.I.P.

Frank Kelly Freas, the acclaimed science-fiction illustrator (and delineator of Alfred E. Neuman) passed away quietly this morning at approximately 4 AM. He was nominated twenty times (a record) for the Hugo Award for his artwork and won ten times (another record) as Best Professional Artist. His artwork graced the covers and/or insides of books by virtually every major science-fiction author, including Isaac Asimov, Robert Heinlein, Arthur C. Clarke, A.E. Van Vogt, Poul Anderson and Frederik Pohl. Still, many knew him best for the seven years he spent as the main cover artist of Mad Magazine.

Freas was born in New York in 1922 and raised in Canada. In college and in the Army, he started out to explore both Medicine and Engineering as possible vocations but kept getting lured towards artwork. After the service, he got a job drawing for an advertising agency in Pittsburgh and began taking night courses at the Art Institute of Pittsburgh. In 1950, he produced a fantasy painting for one of his art classes and at the urging of his friends, submitted it to Weird Tales, the prestigious pulp magazine. When it sold, he was on his way...and there were few honors or important assignments in the field that never went his way. You can view some samples of his work at his website or browse his Mad paintings over at Doug Gilford's Mad Cover Site. (The Kelly Freas covers start with #40 and continue, with occasional interruption, until #74. #70 was actually the last one he painted but they didn't publish them in the order done.)

A frequent, friendly presence at both comic and s-f conventions, Freas (pronounced "freeze") was a charming gent, always available to talk to his many fans on any subject. I recall he once interrupted a conversation we were having when a young, aspiring painter came over to show him a sample of his work. Freas caught a glimpse of it out of the corner of his eye and his immediate reaction was akin to, "Sorry, Mark...but this is an emergency." The kid had great talent, Kelly thought, but was in dire need to being set straight on some of the basics. I eavesdropped for about five minutes as the aspiring painter received solid, no-nonsense advice about all that he was doing wrong. You could almost see the kid becoming a better artist, right before your eyes...and he hadn't even painted anything new yet. Later, Kelly made an unnecessary point of seeking me out to apologize and finish our discussion. As I said, a charming gentleman.

A memorial service is planned. I'll let you know if I hear anything...or you let me know.

• Posted at 11:34 AM · LINK